Tag: capitalism

Over on Metafilter, there was a question recently about whether Disney is evil. There was an interesting side discussion about whether that question even makes sense, given the nature of corporations, and while I was writing my response, the entire side discussion was deleted. I liked my comment, though, so I’m putting it here:

What is a corporation in the first place? Well, for starters, it’s made up entirely of people. A corporation does not have a conscious or a values system — there is no such thing as an evil corporation.

A corporation may be implemented by people, but it’s not made of people–a corporation is made of words. And while the corporation as such might not have consciousness [ed: or a conscience, which Cam points out is probably what the person I was responding to meant], I’d argue that it does have a values system. It is a values system, codified in a corporate charter. Usually, that values system boils down to “make as much money as possible, by any means available”. If that were the primary guideline for a natural person’s life, we’d probably call that person a sociopath.

I’m pretty sure the OP is asking about how ethically the people who implement the Disney corporation have executed its mandate, so this isn’t particularly relevant to the question. It just bothers me to see the promulgation of the idea that a corporation is entirely made of people. A corporation is a program; the people are just the computer it runs on. (For now. Charlie Stross’s books have some interesting speculation about the future of corporations. And people.)

Unfortunately, the full comment I was replying to has been deleted, and I don’t feel comfortable reposting more than the bit I already quoted. So there’s necessarily some missing context. But I think the gist of it is there.